This Thing That Happens When I Change My Mind

Here’s an example from a comment responding to what I wrote about leaving Christianity and becoming an atheist:

A personal relationship with Jesus is what you were missing in your childhood and young adulthood, and that rejection of Jesus Christ has estranged you from your family and caused you to go 180 degrees the other way. I want you to know that I am praying for you; that you would seek Jesus with your whole heart. He died a horrible death because His love for you is so great!! I know He will never reject you, no matter how long you have refused his salvation and indescribable love.

It seems I never really “got” Christianity.

Here’s another example, this time from a response to what I wrote about leaving creationism and coming to accept the science behind evolution:

Libby doesn’t say whether she attended a Christian or secular college. Sadly, in the USA today there isn’t much difference between the two types of schools concerning Genesis—and even the authority of the Bible—as surveys in Already Compromised showed. Either way, she was challenged, fought for a while, and gave up. It’s difficult to say why, but she does seem to have some misunderstandings about Genesis and the Bible despite her exposure to creation apologetics.

It seems I never really “got” Christianity.

Oh and look at this! This one comes from a response to what I’ve written about leaving anti-abortion politics behind and becoming pro-choice:

Sadly, this blog post is little more than a testament to the fact that Libby never actually properly understood the pro-life ethic in the first place. It serves as a warning that we, the pro-life movement, need to ensure that our members have actually properly reasoned their way to the pro-life commitments they profess, rather than just merely going along with the rest of pro-life crowd, because their parents told them to do so, without ever being adequately formed in the profoundly important and logically sound ethical truths that we proclaim.

It seems I never really “got” the pro-life movement.

Seriously, this is getting old.

Because the thing is, if anyone got it, it was me. Jesus was my best friend and closest confidant, I devoured every creationist book I could get my hands on, and I cried over the deaths of the unborn. No one who knew me then would ever have questioned whether I “got it.” I was “on fire” for God, the sort of teen and young adult conservative evangelicalism holds up as an example of success. Nobody questioned whether I “got it” until I changed my mind.

Libby Anne grew up in a large evangelical homeschool family highly involved in the Christian Right. College turned her world upside down, and she is today an atheist, a feminist, and a progressive. She blogs about leaving religion, her experience with the Christian Patriarchy and Quiverfull movements, the detrimental effects of the "purity culture," the contradictions of conservative politics, and the importance of feminism.